


Away From Him

by dawnmarie



Category: Gackt (Musician) - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Bar, Drinking, Gen, Ghosts, Jrock - Freeform, Malice Mizer - Freeform, Mana - Freeform, kami - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-12
Updated: 2013-01-12
Packaged: 2017-11-25 04:16:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/635018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dawnmarie/pseuds/dawnmarie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gackt and Jon sit and drink. A simple question leads to a complicated answer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Away From Him

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by several interviews Gackt has given where he talks about his near death experiences as well as how he has seen ghosts.
> 
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> 
> Contains a line from the following poem:
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> _Laugh, and the world laughs with you;_  
>  _Weep, and you weep alone._  
>  _For this sad old earth must borrow its mirth, _  
>  _But has grief enough of its own._  
>  _\--Ella Wheeler Wilcox___

“Um, Gackt,” Jon said as he pulled his leather jacket tighter against him, “what is up with those contacts? I mean you have got beautiful eyes and---“

Jon quickly felt a punch in the back.

“I thought Cha, or maybe You would have mentioned—“

“Things that are not to be brought up against penalty of immediate death? Yeah, I was told that but you know us blunt Americans.”

Gackt laughed, slight lines darting out from the corners of his blue eyes as he did so. “Blunt American, my ass. More like nosey American. Let me guess, they also told you stuff along the lines of “don’t ask too many questions about my personal life” and “don’t bring up Mana.“

“Yeah, something like that.” Jon said as he shifted forwards in his seat. “Well?”

“They were just screwing with you.”

“Well, I see from your attitude that they know every minute detail about you then.”

Gackt bit his lip and fidgeted with an earring. “Not really, but you are American. You make me feel bolder. I am Japanese after all.” He sighed and lit a cigar. “It’s kind of a long story, how long do you have?”

Jon mimed looking at his watch and then took a drink of his beer. “I don’t have a hot date, if that is what you mean.”

“Okay, Jon, I really am an over 400 year old vampire. Now you know the short version of my long and sad story.”

Jon couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of it all. He had thought Gackt was done with that story. “Bull. Keep this up and I will need to get a shovel.”

Gackt made a funny face, as if his beer had suddenly gone a bit sour. “Shovel?”

“Figure of speech. Go on, with the truth this time or else I will leave your sorry ass here and find a hot date after all.”

Gackt sighed and looked down at the beer in his glass. “Okay. They’re for protection. That whole “eyes are the windows to the soul business”—well at least for me, it is true.” Gackt ordered another round and then stubbed out what was left of his cigar and quickly lit another one before continuing. “No one can see in when I wear them but I can still see everyone.”

“So, they’re your security blanket?”

“Yeah. See a hot chick that I like, she’ll never know. Feel nervous on a talk show? They’ll never know either. I don’t know where I’d be without the little guys.”

Jon laughed. “The little guys?”

“I was calling them "left" and "right" but that just sounded stupid so ‘little guys’ it is. Mana always bitched about me wearing them. He said they gave me even more attention that I was already getting, and if you ask him any attention I got was way too much. And no, before you ask, I would have kept wearing them even if he loved them.”

“I’m not convinced. There has to be more of a reason that you would wear them then to just hide a little nervousness. Besides, it's not like you haven't not worn them. Take that new movie of yours...”

"Yeah, but that was fake. Yoshi isn't real." Gackt suddenly pounded the bar. "I have nothing to worry about when I am playing a role."

The mood had suddenly shifted and Jon didn't like it one bit. "Gackt, I'm sorry dude. If you don't want to talk about this…"

_“Laugh, and the world laughs with you; Weep, and you weep alone.”_

“Huh?”

“I always thought it would make for a pretty song. I remember reading that line somewhere in a book once.”

“Nice try at avoiding the conversation at hand.”

"I know. I keep playing games with you when what I should be doing is telling the truth. I should be honest. I’m getting too old to keep this to myself." Another beer went down Gackt’s throat before he continued. "It's more than keeping people out so they can't see I am nervous or fidgety. It's to keep me from seeing them.”

“Them?”

“Yeah, the ghosts. God knows I have mentioned them enough in the past.” Sure Gackt had talked about the ghosts in the past. How it had all started when he had almost died as a child, the ghosts he had seen, the children who he knew were going to die when he was in the hospital all of those years ago. Sure, yes, he had talked about that but not about the constant voices he had heard, the faces he saw that all seemed to be in constant agony. No, he had never talked about any of that. “When I started wearing them much later on, I found that, the contacts, for whatever reason, keep the ghosts away so I can lead a somewhat normal life.” Gackt then ordered yet another round, not noticing that Jon still had two full ones sitting in front of him.

“Christ.” Quite an inadequate response for such a confession but it was the best Jon could manage at the moment. From any other person Jon would have thought it was an elaborate joke played on the new guy but Gackt’s confession was so sincere that he had to believe him.

“I’m sorry to dump this on you.”

“No, go on.”

“I had them in constantly after I left Malice Mizer. I never knew that Kami was gone until I was told. I could have helped him maybe if I had taken them out for five minutes.”

“You can’t blame yourself. He would have been gone either way.”

“I didn’t help.”

“No, not ‘didn’t help’, ‘couldn’t help’ as in could not. There is a difference. You can’t blame yourself.”

“Easy for you to say. I am the one that has to keep living with the memory that I could have changed things if I weren’t so scared. I should have been more of a man.”

“There you go again, with your thoughts on what makes a man a man. You can’t be perfect. No one can. Not even you.”

“I never wanted to be perfect. Not really. I just wanted to be able to save one person for a change. It turns out all I am is a plain ordinary guy.”

"Congratulations. You are one of us, a human being." Jon patted Gackt on the back. "There's no shame in that."

_And maybe one day I'll believe it,_ Gackt thought to himself.


End file.
